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Airdrop so inconsistent - anyone know why?

A basic google search yields dozens of frustrated articles about the complete instability and unreliability of Airdrop. Theses articles span from 2016 up until this month in 2020, which means no major improvements on this feature in 4 years. It's a great concept when it decides to work, but when it just stops working for NO REASON at all, I find my workflows being massively disrupted - case and point...RIGHT NOW. Once again, I'm on forums spouting frustrations into cyberspace.


Other than turning wifi on/off or checking for updates, there's nothing that seems to work. All of my devices are up to date and I have discoverability set to "everyone" across the board. Trying to send a Logic session from my laptop to my desktop. I've done it dozens and dozens of times, each time holding my breath for Airdrop success. As of the last month, my success rate has dropped to zero and WeTransfer has been my fix. This is what we call...dumb. Dumb that a person with THREE Apple devices, mere feet from each other, has to rely on a sketchy third party online product to transfer simple files too large to email.


Anyone from Apple, if you're reading...you honestly should just remove this feature until you've got it worked out. As of now, it's a waste of space, time and energy for people like me that are constantly in need of quick file share options between devices. No point in offering people free chocolate if it tastes like crap. 💩


(note - Apple doesn't even list "Airdrop" as an option in what the post is related to. Says a lot right there)

iMac 27", macOS 10.12

Posted on Apr 22, 2020 12:55 PM

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Posted on Apr 22, 2020 1:05 PM

Apple doesn't read these forums.


AirDrop requires both WiFi and Bluetooth. Double-check that both are working on both machines. Do you have the firewall enabled on either machine? What are your Airdrop security settings on both machines? There are some really tricky bugs that only affect people who try fancy things. All of Apple's Continuity features can be affected by copying home directories or by using clones. These features work using unique tokens for each device. But if you copy setups from one device to another, you may have copied the unique identifier, making it no longer unique.


Also, it would help if you described exactly what problem you are seeing. Doe the transfer fail? Or can you not see the other machine?

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Question marked as Top-ranking reply

Apr 22, 2020 1:05 PM in response to JoshuaDanger

Apple doesn't read these forums.


AirDrop requires both WiFi and Bluetooth. Double-check that both are working on both machines. Do you have the firewall enabled on either machine? What are your Airdrop security settings on both machines? There are some really tricky bugs that only affect people who try fancy things. All of Apple's Continuity features can be affected by copying home directories or by using clones. These features work using unique tokens for each device. But if you copy setups from one device to another, you may have copied the unique identifier, making it no longer unique.


Also, it would help if you described exactly what problem you are seeing. Doe the transfer fail? Or can you not see the other machine?

Airdrop so inconsistent - anyone know why?

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